God Bless Chloe Felger!
by SelDear
Summary: Life has a habit of pitching you curve balls. [Fluff, silliness, and a high school AU.]


**NOTES**: This was written as a backup fic for a ficathon - specifically an 'AU ficathon' where all the characters are in a completely different setting. The option I took was for Shermer High, and the requirements were Sam and Jack as chaperons at the prom who end up acting like prom dates themselves. You may spot a few familiar names in the story! Just a few. :smirks:

**God Bless Chloe Felger!**

As he surveyed the empty ballroom of the Cheyenne hotel, Jack O'Neill reflected that life had a habit of throwing curve balls, then laughing when you struck out.

For example, he'd hoped to avoid being stuck with the job of chaperoning the prom this year. He'd done it last year, and, in all fairness, it should have landed with another group of staff. Then Chloe Felger went into early-but-false labour, Jay became completely useless at _everything_ instead of mostly useless at everything but trigonometry, and Jack got stiffed with the chaperoning deal.

Goddamn Chloe Felger.

Footsteps behind him presaged the arrival of one of his fellow teachers. In heels which meant female and Janet Fraiser.

Except not.

"All ready for an exciting night of watching students grope each other?" The voice was definitely not Janet's.

Jack spun on his heel and nearly lost his balance entirely.

_Holy shit, fucking hell, and sweet Georgia Brown!_

Samantha Carter, physics teacher at Shermer High, was wearing something...floaty in a shade of blue-grey that really brought out the blue of her eyes. And strappy, heeled shoes that made her long legs look even longer.

And an expression that clearly wondered if he'd lost his mind. "Sir?"

His teeth snapped shut so fast, he lost a few tastebuds. It stung, but Jack figured they'd grow back. Right now, he had to say something or risk looking like even more of an idiot than he already did. "Carter." He managed to get his voice actually working. "Carter. Good to see you with such an upbeat attitude."

The rueful smile she gave him was adorable, even if it was prefaced with a sharp look. "Sorry, Jack. Bad memories of my own prom."

He arched a brow, intrigued. This was one story he hadn't yet heard. "Spill?"

Blonde hair gleamed in the lighting. "Oh, no," she said, smiling. "Definitely not!"

"I'll show you mine if you show me yours." On second thought, he probably shouldn't have said that - especially not to an attractive co-worker with whom the FQ - Flirtation Quotient - had gone up several hundred points in the last six months.

Besides there was that whole sexual harassment thing, too - he could just imagine getting hauled up before George for making inappropriate remarks to the physics teacher. Then again, she sometimes made inappropriate remarks back.

All was fair in love and flirting.

The look she gave him wasn't apparently offended - more amused. "You first."

Okay, he could do that. "Sonia McAdams," he said. "Cheerleader. I asked her before she started going out with Gary Benson and she said it was okay, she'd still go to the prom with me. I ended up spending half the night watching Sonia and Benson work their way around to being horizontal."

"And the other half?"

He paused, then figured he was in for the one-cent piece, he might as well go the whole shiny silver dollar. "Oh, making out with Benson's date, which turned out to be a really good kisser."

She didn't quite look as though she believed him, but spoke after a moment's pause. "My date turned up to the prom drunk."

Okay. Not the first thing a girl wanted in a prom date. Jack winced. "Not very polite of him."

"Well," she shrugged a little, and her 'liquid silver' necklace shimmered, drawing attention to the line of her throat. Jack ran his eyes along her skin before he remembered that he was supposed to be professional and fixed his gaze on her ear while she stared into the middle distance. She had a really gorgeous ear, too. "I didn't much care." Blue eyes flickered to him. "I was angry at my Dad at the time - he was in the middle of all these meetings, going for a promotion at his job." A flush touched her cheeks. "I decided I was going to have sex with him."

Samantha Carter, rebel with a mission. Jack looked away, deciding it would be safer than looking at her and imagining having sex with a seventeen year-old Samantha Carter - or even her thirty-something counterpart.

_Job, Jack. Focus on the job._ "So," he said lightly. "I guess it didn't happen?"

Her smile was wry. "My Dad bust in on us in the den. He drove Michael home and when he got back we had a screaming fight."

Definitely not a prom night Jack would want to remember either. "Okay," he said. "You win."

"Thanks."

"Hey, I'm just saying..."

Sam rolled her eyes, but she had a smile on her face as she turned to look around the hotel ballroom. "Things have changed so much. It used to be that the school gym was good enough for prom. And now..."

Jack glanced around the room. It looked pretty much the same as last time - tables, chairs, snacks on the tables, and a drink table down the side. He'd have to set T to watching it. No student would spike the punch with T watching - not even John Sheppard. "Well, higher expectations and all that," he said lightly. A moment later, a more serious thought struck him. "Did we check the hotel guest register against the student list?"

"Daniel was going to," she said. "But as of yesterday, they were being good."

"An intelligent batch of students," Jack muttered. "Amazing."

She laughed. "_Now_ who has an upbeat attitude?"

He was about to make a retort, but nearly yelped when she slipped her hand into the crook of his arm - not for pain or shock, just for sheer unexpectedness.

Was Sam Carter, brilliant physicist, and gorgeous woman, really leaning against him with all the ease of a long-time girlfriend on a date?

Yup. She was.

The words 'be still my beating heart' came to mind. That or...

Nope, nothing.

_Be still, my beating heart._

Voices from behind them heralded the arrival of the first students - the prom committee who'd organised the night.

"I think we've got company," Sam said, glancing back at the door where the students hadn't quite arrived.

Jack gave his not-date a wry smile and indicated the teachers' table. "Shall we?"

-oOo-

On the whole, it wasn't turning out half as bad as Jack feared. The students had arrived sober and Daniel reported that none of them had tried to book a room for any horizontal dancing - or if they had, they'd been sneakily roundabout and hadn't yet been caught.

It seemed that good, clean fun was being had by most, although if Sheppard wasn't careful where he put his hands, Ms. Emmagen would wipe the floor with him.

And Jack would sell tickets.

Okay, so Sheppard wasn't that bad. Just young, cocky, and needing to be taken down a peg or a dozen.

"Not as bad as you feared?" Sam handed him a glass of punch. Unspiked. Between T and Harry, the punch bowls were safe - although Jack kept an eye on Harry, just in case the little rat thought the kids could do with some encouragement. As if kids had ever _needed_ encouragement to be stupid, silly, and asinine. God knew, Jack certainly hadn't. But things were pretty good so far.

"I'm impressed," he said. "They've behaved themselves so far. But the night's not over yet."

"So upbeat," she murmured.

"Oh, I _like_ dances and proms," Jack replied, looking down at her. "I just have a problem with the students."

She laughed and sipped at her punch watching the slow dance out on the dance floor before scanning the clusters of students who'd retired from this dance. "So, how much did you lose?"

"You know, I consider it very tacky to bet on students' romantic lives," Jack began.

Her look said she knew his name, address, and tax-file number and wouldn't be getting a visit from Santa Claus that year for Being A Bad Boy And Lying To His Colleague.

"Ten." He glared at her when she laughed. "How much did you lose?"

"Nothing," she said. "I'm ahead."

"How," Jack asked with a hint of asperity, "does an astrophysicist know what the hell is happening on the Shermer High senior dating circuit? And why didn't you share anything with me?"

"You didn't ask, sir."

Nobody quite knew where Sam had acquired the 'sir' she used when she addressed Jack. Daniel thought it was something to do with her background as a military brat, and her instinctive recognition of Jack's authority as Vice-Principal. Jack thought that was a load of bullshit. Of course, he didn't voice that thought aloud.

He sighed. "I really did think the Emmagen girl had more sense."

"By which you mean she should have stuck with a guy who had the taste and discrimination to be captain of the hockey team, rather than date a guy who thinks football is 'a real man's game'?"

"No!"

"Uhuh."

"Really."

"Uhuh."

"I bet you dated the football captain when you were at school," Jack grumbled.

"No," she said, "I wasn't pretty or popular enough to date the football captain."

"Neither is Teyla," said Jack, and then regretted the glib response. "Okay, that was mean of me."

"Very." Sam's eyes flickered over to the girl out on the dance floor. "You know, she's got good instincts for leadership. Caldwell said it was she who actually got the team to work together while Sheppard ran around playing football hero."

"Doesn't surprise me." And it didn't. Teyla really was a team player - unlike some Jack could name. "She's just not my sort, Carter."

Which was a piss-poor excuse for a snide comment about a student whose only real faults were that she was dating the football captain and didn't excel at academics.

"And your sort would be...?"

Well, for starters, Jack preferred them mature. And blonde. It was a bonus if they had big blue eyes and a gift for finding new and inventive ways to describe her work to him. So far, they'd been through the apple of the space-time continuum, the Jell-O of the universe, and the spiral fork-and-jet-bead artwork of black hole accretion discs.

Of course, as an amateur astronomer he'd already known about accretion discs, but it was so much fun watching her explain it to him in the teacher's lounge that he kept completely quiet about it until she remembered he owned a telescope.

But to explain all that would get him into trouble. So he settled for saying, "Uh, not Ms. Emmagen?"

"So you went for the cheerleader sort like Tina Grantham?"

There was an edge to her voice that suggested that 'the cheerleader sort' didn't rate very high on Sam Carter's list. Not entirely surprising. Jack couldn't imagine her as a typical cheerleader. Perhaps a very _atypical _one. _Very_ atypical.

"Uh...can I take the fifth on that?"

"No."

Damn.

"Okay, yes, I went for the cheerleader sort," he admitted. "But most guys do."

He was in the shit now. It was plain in the slight coolness of her face as she turned back to the dance floor. "Rodney didn't."

"Carter, McKay's a geek. He's going to go with the nearest female to hand. He'd have asked you if he thought he had a probability without a dozen zeros at the end of it."

Her smile was wry. "Just don't say that too loudly around Katie Brown, okay?"

"What do you take me for, Carter?" Jack was offended. Katie Brown wasn't exactly the most outspoken of students in his sophomore class, but she was a nice girl. Privately, he felt sorry for her: she had an obvious crush on the young man who only really paid attention to his physics teacher or the projects he worked on.

"The kind of guy who went for the cheerleader sort?"

Okay, so he'd asked for that.

Jack sipped at his drink as the music changed from a slow dance to something jazzy. Thank God someone on the prom committee had had the exquisite sense to hire a live band instead of a DJ. Jack would have gone crazy listening to 'pumpin' tunes' - or whatever it was that kids called that music - all night.

Most of the kids left the floor. Some - the brave ones - stayed on or were persuaded to stay on by their dates.

Liz Weir was laughing as her date led her through the moves. The tall, dark young man smirked down at her, then bent and brushed a kiss just behind her ear - probably murmuring into it at the same time. Jack narrowed his eyes.

"Carter, explain to me why the nice girls go for the guys with trouble written all over them?"

Sam followed his gaze, then turned back to arch a brow at him. "I have to explain that to _you_? Besides, Ronon Dex isn't _that_ bad - you kept him in your class all year."

Good point. "I didn't say he _was_ trouble - I just said he had trouble written all over him."

"And you never did?"

"I never did." He could say that with a straight face.

Of course, she wasn't going to believe him with a straight face. "If you say so, Jack." She shook her head as she looked out over the chattering adolescents that formed the graduating class of Shermer High this year. "Why are we discussing the love lives of the students?"

"For the same reason we bet on them?"

They looked at each other, smirked a little, and said in unison. "We have no life?"

"You two are scary," said Daniel Jackson as he came up to them. "And you worry me."

Jack glanced at Sam who was smiling. "And you realise this _now_, Dr. Jackson?"

"In the archaeological world, it can take years of study to discover the meaning in otherwise random bits of information," Daniel began with mock-solemnity. "Conclusions are often complex and multi-layered--"

"Why don't you just say we're an enigma?"

"Strictly speaking, Jack, you're not. An enigma is something that can't be explained - at least at the point of observation. But something like, say, chaos theory, is complex and multi-layered, but can be explained...in a limited way." He glanced at Sam. "Right?"

She laughed. "Very good, Daniel. 'A' for memory-work."

"I hope you didn't give finals marks away that easily," Jack commented dryly.

"At least they only had to get the answer with a few lines of explanation," she replied. "Unlike your essays."

He was proud of those essays. "They were good essays! Separated the sheep from the goats." Not that there'd been any goats in his class. Jack hated freeloaders and didn't tolerate idiots. If a student took his class, they either shaped up or shipped out.

Daniel rolled his eyes. "You know, that metaphor might have been appropriate when it was used in biblical times, Jack, but for a modern American high school, it's about as suitable as a mummified body in a movie theatre."

"Nice simile," Jack said, unperturbed. "'B' for inventiveness. 'C' for appropriateness."

"'A' for speed of delivery," said Daniel as he pushed up his glasses with a smile.

"You're about to get Cs for paying attention," Sam advised, moving towards the table the teachers had claimed as their own for the night. "They're starting the presentations."

And, true enough, while they'd been talking, the president of the prom organising committee had taken the microphone and was asking people to take a seat for the presentations.

"I wonder what manner of presentations they came up with this year," Jack muttered to her as Daniel veered off towards the school doctor on whom he had a crush, but didn't quite yet know it.

They reached the table and Sam seated herself in a flurry of blue-grey dress and a shimmer of silver necklace. "Didn't you look at the list they turned in to Daniel?"

"They handed in a list?"

"Hammond's orders. He didn't want them coming up with inappropriate presentations."

"I thought the point _was_..." Jack caught her look. Right. No inappropriate presentations. Where was the fun in that?

Then again, he was the Vice-Principal. Fun for the children was definitely Frowned Upon.

The awards were more or less as expected.

John Sheppard got the 'Big Damn Hero' award - an Indiana Jones-style hat. Upon expressing his disappointment that they hadn't gotten him a whip as well, some wit yelled that Teyla didn't _need_ the whip to keep him in line. There wasn't going to be much argument with that - not when the girl was on the martial arts team. Sheppard smirked and sauntered off amidst laughter from his peers.

The 'Tank Grrl' award went to Laura Cadman - a toy tank that had seen better years. The cheerleader grinned as she sashayed back to her date - exchange student Carson Beckett. Rumour had it, she'd already received an offer for a dancing scholarship, but was headed for the Air Force academy down in Colorado Springs.

"I heard Sheppard's also headed for the Air Force," Sam murmured when Jack shared that knowledge with her.

Jack shook his head as his fingers drummed out a rhythm on the tablecloth. "God help the Air Force."

Rodney McKay came up for the 'Road Runner award' - a poster of Wile E. Coyote. Someone had crossed out 'Coyote' in heavy texta and substituted 'McKay' over the top so it read: 'Wile E. McKay - Genius!' He beamed all the way across his face, and practically skipped his way back to Katie.

"He's going to be insufferable now," Sam sighed.

"You mean, more so than usual?"

She smacked him lightly on the leg. "Be nice. He's gotten offers from five universities so far - including MIT and Cal Tech."

Jack whistled softly. "Which one will he take?"

"Actually, he said something about North-Western up in Canada."

He gaped. What kind of idiot would turn down two of the biggest universities in the US to go to Canada? "Why?"

"You'd have to ask Rodney that." Her brow furrowed as she squinted at the stage area. "Are those knitting needles they're giving Ronon?"

It looked like it to Jack. "Probably some in-joke." Which was usually what the presentations were about, anyway.

"And now," said the president of the prom committee, "because we've hogged the dance floor all night, and we know that Dr. Jackson is just _dying_ to get on out here and boogie...we have...the Faculty Dance!"

Cue much cheering and clapping from the students.

Cue astonished and shocked looks from the faculty.

Cue Jack turning to his colleague. "Daniel?"

"This wasn't me, Jack. I'll swear it by any god you want."

The cheers and claps were now hoots and hollers. Damn kids. Give them a prom and they'd walk all over you!

He stood and the cheering got louder, but he shook his head and held up his hands for quiet. "Very funny, Allison. _No_." There was no _way_ he was going to dance in front of a two hundred students at a senior prom.

"Aw, Mr. O'Neill..."

"Come on, Mr. O'Neill!"

"I'll bet Ms. Carter wants to dance!"

He gave Liz Weir the look that said she was getting a 'D', honours student or not.

Jack was _so _not gonna even think about dancing with Sam in front of the whole senior class plus their prom dates. He was forty, not seventeen.

Even if he suspected it would be fun.

A glance at Sam showed her scarlet-cheeked, while the other members of faculty variously shrugged or shook their heads.

"Ms. Fraiser wants to dance!" Someone yelled, and, sure enough, Janet was grinning away and nodding her head at him.

Jack glared at her. "Fraiser, you are one sick puppy."

"It's a good thing I'm the school doctor, then?" The dark eyes twinkled.

He threw up his hands in despair and an approving cheer went up. "One faculty dance. One. But the music's gotta be something _classic_. No rock or pop."

"Go O'Neill!"

He glared at the heckler. "Don't get rowdy, Sheppard! I still have to sign-off on your report card!"

The prospect didn't daunt the football captain one bit. He stuck both thumbs up in the air with a smirk.

Most of the teachers seemed resigned to their fate - some of the ladies appeared to be looking forward to it. "Daniel," Jack said, "this is all your fault."

"And I didn't say a thing, either," Daniel muttered.

Up on the stage, Allison had turned around and was whispering something to the band. They conferred a minute, and then she turned back to the microphone with undisguised glee. "Okay! We have...the 2004 Senior Class Prom Faculty Dance!"

She cued the...Jack squinted at the base drum - Jazz Hands Band, and with a soft patter of drums, the song began. Slow and moody, gentle and seductive, the strains of 'Sway With Me' began moving through the air.

God, where _had_ the kids dug up this band?

Daniel was _beyond_ dead. Jack would kill him, and then find something that could resurrect his colleague just so he could have the pleasure of killing him again and again.

He sighed as Janet practically dragged Daniel onto the floor. Not that Daniel seemed to be protesting that much. The new drama teacher - what kind of a name was 'Vala' anyway? - had lost her usual melodramatic pout and was pushing Malcolm Barrett ahead of her. God help Mal. And, for a wonder, Mitchell seemed to have gotten over whatever stoush he'd had with Carolyn Lam earlier this month and was taking the initiative in leading her out onto the floor.

More than one student was regarding him with the evil eye of, 'And you, Mr. O'Neill?'

Ah, what the hell. He was in for a penny, he might as well go in for the whole shiny silver dollar.

Jack held out a hand to her. "Ms. Carter?"

It was such a relief when she took it. For a moment there, he'd thought that sanity might prevail and she'd refuse to dance. Which would have been fine by him...just not so great on the ego.

He glared at the students cheering and wolf-whistling at them. "You're all getting 'C's," he said.

As he drew her into his arms on the dance floor, Sam looked like suspiciously like she was stifling a smile.

"What?"

"Nothing," she said, innocently.

"_When marimba rhythms start to play  
Dance with me, make me sway.  
Like a lazy ocean hugs the shore  
Hold me close, sway me more..."_

The singer really wasn't all that bad, Jack supposed as he and Carter began dancing. Considering there'd been at least two songs during which the guy was screaming out completely unintelligible words, he was doing a good job of the melodious tune.

Most of the faculty was on the floor by now, taking advantage of the moment.

Now that the dance had actually started, some of the students had lost interest and were chatting. Many still watched, and a group had their hands in the air and were waving them back and forth, grinning like idiots - among them, most of his senior English class. Jack glared at a select few, most of who grinned or made faces back.

And the band played on and on.

It was a good dance, really. Good music, nice setting, and a gorgeous partner. Nothing showy or fancy. He and Sam weren't wowing the audience, but then Jack had never been a show pony. Besides, it looked like T and Ishta were doing a rather more complex dance number on the other side of the floor. Even as his eyes strayed over to them, T dipped Ishta, low enough that the blonde's hair traced the floor, and the crowd whooped in delight.

Sam laughed. "Thank God for them."

"Taking the spotlight off the rest of us?" Jack agreed. He was more than happy to slow-dance with his hand resting on the warm curve of her waist beneath the smooth floaty material of her dress, and inhaling the faint floral scent of her perfume with every breath.

T could have the showy beauty of the Domestics teacher - and was welcome to her. Jack had his kind of woman dancing in his arms as though she'd always belonged there.

They danced smoothly, as though they'd been partners for a long time. He supposed it should worry him.

"You've got good rhythm," he said.

"Dancing lessons," she said. "When I was six. And a little tai-chi now and then."

"A change from all those equations, huh?"

She lifted a smile to him. "The way hockey is a change from English Lit." Her eyes twinkled. "Gets the blood up."

Jack could think of other things that would get his blood up. In the middle of a dance with a beautiful woman, how could he not?

Of course, he wasn't seventeen anymore.

But neither was she.

He wasn't sure quite what tipped him off. Maybe the way her eyes didn't leave his face, or the slightest brush of her thighs against his as they moved across the floor. Perhaps it was the hand on his shoulder, tracing the weave of his jacket in faint caress, or the expression on her features.

"_Other dancers may be on the floor,  
Dear, but my eyes will see only you.  
Only you have the magic technique.  
When we sway I go weak..."_

He nearly kissed her.

In the middle of a dance floor, with two hundred pairs of eyes on them, Jack O'Neill, Vice-Principal of Shermer High, nearly kissed Physics teacher Samantha Carter full on the mouth at the senior class prom. With tongue.

It was the cheers and wolf-whistles that recalled him to himself - and her, too, if her startled look was any indication. He went red. She went redder. Their colleagues grinned at them or gave them the evil eyebrow.

_Shit._

The moment was lost and so was the mood - and Jack could feel the attention focused on them as they moved across the floor. He could feel her attention on him as they danced, and it was making him just a little bit anxious.

"Sorry about that," he muttered. "Forgot myself."

"Me, too," she murmured. Then, a few steps later, "Take a raincheck?"

The question was innocuous enough to take a few moments to register. Then, his eyes flew to hers. Did she really mean...?

She really did.

Jack leaned in. "Better be sure about that raincheck, Ms. Carter."

Her reply whispered across his skin like a caress. "I don't make empty offers, Mr. O'Neill."

"Good." He smirked, but it was an effort not to shudder, and the rest of the dance was something of a blur. What Jack did remember was the way they moved, almost hip to hip, with an intensity that completely stole the spotlight from T and Ishta - although he didn't know that until later.

When the song ended, the band leader yelled, "Give them a round of applause - the faculty of Shermer High!"

Students were eagerly rushing back to the dance floor as the next song began up - something upbeat and boppy that Jack didn't recognise. He led Sam off the floor, aware that her fingers were still laced in his, and that the side of her breast was lightly pressing against his arm as they moved against the crowd.

"Better watch where you put those hands, Mr. O'Neill," Sheppard said with a broad smirk as he and Teyla made their way onto the floor. "Get yourself slapped."

Jack fumed, until they were out of the crush. "I'd refuse to sign off on his report card--" He began as they headed back to their table.

Sam laughed. "But we'd only be stuck with him for another year."

"Yeah," he muttered with a grimace. "The Air Force can have him and welcome."

At the table, there were a few arch glances. "I thought T and Ishta were the ones with the dancing moves," Janet said, grinning all over her pretty face. "You showed us all up out there!" Not that she seemed unhappy about it. In fact, the woman looked positively gleeful.

Daniel, damn his eyes, was looking more than a little amused.

"Believe me, it wasn't intentional," Jack said, letting Sam seat herself first before leaning over to pour them both glasses of water.

"But that's what makes it all the more fun," Janet said with a quick smile before it faded and she stood. "I'd stay and tease you about it," she said, "but I see trouble brewing over by the punch table."

Jack turned sharply. "Someone trying to spike it?"

"You might prefer that," said the doc with a grim smile. "It looks like Isabel Thomson has decided to confront Louise Maynard about the theft of a prom date."

Sam sucked her breath in through her teeth. "Oh dear."

The diminutive school doctor shrugged. "What's a prom night without at least one meow-boom?" She headed off in the direction of the punch table.

_Meow-boom?_

Jack gave Daniel a querying look and the other man shrugged. Women-talk. Completely incomprehensible. And he didn't see anything happening over by the table. Two girls looking a little belligerent, but nothing else. If they started a fight on the other hand...

"You're not going over?" Daniel's slightly surprised question turned his head, but the other man was looking at Sam.

Sam sipped her water. "Daniel, relationships and me are like fish and bicycles."

"This from the woman who came out of the betting pool _with_ money," Jack noted.

"But that's different, that's only _seeing_ relationships. This is more like...like dealing with them."

"And you don't deal well with relationships?"

The question was a bit more personal than he'd intended. But she returned his gaze very levelly, "Not as a general rule, no."

Warning and invitation both. Whatever. So she had scars? Jack did, too. And his were impressive. That didn't change anything - neither the attraction he felt for her, nor the invitation she'd issued and he'd accepted.

"Should I run and get the fire extinguisher?"

Jack glared at the woman who'd just bounced up to the table, linked her arm in with Daniel's and was resting her cheek on his shoulder while he tried to surreptitiously detach her - and failed.

"Oh don't stop on my account." The drama teacher's blue eyes twinkled in abject merriment. "At the rate you're going, I could sell tickets!"

Sam sighed. "Vala, do you mind?"

"Not at all," Vala retorted, still grinning.

"Doran, go find someone else to bother."

"But it's so much _fun_ bothering you, O'Neill," she said, dimpling. "You pretend to be a crusty old curmudgeon, but you're really this soft, sugary fondant cream. It's so very cute."

Jack opened his mouth to retort that he was definitely _not_ a fondant cream, but she'd already turned to Daniel. The woman had the attention span of a three year old with ADHD.

"Daniel, I need you to help me check out the men's toilets. I think some of the boys might be smoking in there."

As he and Sam exchanged looks at the typically abrupt change of topic, Jack wondered why Vala was asking Daniel to check out the guy smokers. After all, there was T, Mitchell, Barrett, and Maybourne, all of whom were eminently more suited to act as watchdog - to say nothing of Jack who was the Deputy Principal and had serious clout.

Okay, so Mitchell would probably tell the guys to put it away, see them out and say nothing of it. And Maybourne would probably confiscate both cigarettes and lighter and then smoke them later at his own leisure. Barrett would play hardball, though. Rumour had it he'd once been a federal agent of the Fox Mulder kind - except for the bit about the aliens and paranormal stuff. In Jack's mind, that produced the question of what the hell he was doing at Shermer teaching high school students. And T could do 'menacing' - or at least 'seriously in trouble' with little more than the lift of an eyebrow.

Then again, Vala had her sights quite firmly fixed on Daniel as compared to any of the other male teachers at Shermer. It occasioned quite a bit of entertainment for the faculty.

Daniel eyed her. "Do you mean I'm going to look through the men's toilets while you look through the ladies?"

"That's what I said." Vala began leading him away.

Jack watched them go, waited until they were out of earshot then turned to Sam. "He's in trouble."

"When isn't he?" Sam laughed. Then something across the room caught her eye. "Harry's beckoning me over to the drinks table."

"Probably spiked the punch himself," Jack said, stretching his legs out. "Well, better you than me." Harry got on Jack's nerves most of the time.

Her fingers prodded his shoulder as she stood. "I'll see you later."

"Yeahsureyoubetcha." He leaned back.

Janet had the catfight well in hand, his colleagues were all off making sure the kids didn't get into any situations from which the school couldn't decry all responsibility, and it looked like Liz Weir and Ronon Dex were coming over to talk to him - students he could at least stand.

He even had a standing 'raincheck' with Samantha Carter for...well...later. Whenever that might be.

No, the night was definitely not half as bad as he'd feared.

-oOo-

"All done for another year," he sighed with relief.

They were walking through the lobby of the hotel, nodding briefly at the desk staff. The students were gone - either out on the town or to whatever private parties they'd set up beforehand. The room was being cleaned, the bond payment was collected, and the manager didn't look as though he'd object to hosting Shermer High's 2005 Senior Prom next year.

"And another class of students about to be let out on the world."

"God help the world," Jack muttered as they headed towards the elevator lobby.

She laughed, and pushed at him with affectionate amusement. "Vala's right about you, you know. You only pretend to be crusty and bad-tempered."

"And I do it so well," he said, willing to concede it at this hour with nobody around to hear them.

"I'm not arguing with that!" Sam gave him a flirty little smirk.

In revenge, Jack slipped an arm behind her, and tickled his fingers down her side. She jerked away with a sharp inhalation, although it was more surprised than shocked. Then she promptly turned and poked him in the ribs. "Stop that, you."

That began a laughing tussle that resulted in him 'wrestling' her into the corner of the elevator when it arrived. It ended with her arms around his neck and their mouths all over each other.

Jack couldn't remember the last time he'd kissed a woman in an elevator.

Of course, right now, he couldn't remember much of anything, care of Sam Carter's extremely talented mouth. Not such a bad thing, really.

Except for being in a hotel elevator.

The elevator car started moving - but not down to the parking lot. Up towards the guest rooms, and they broke off, staring at the LCD panel indicating the floor as though wondering when it had gained a life of its own.

Jack reached out and stabbed one of the parking lot buttons.

"Is that where your car is parked?"

"No," he replied. "But it makes us look a little less like we were making out in an elevator."

And when the elevator doors opened on the thirteenth floor to show one of the hotel staff, they were spooned against the back of the elevator box, as hands-on as if they'd just come from senior prom.

Which they had, in a way.

Just not _their_ senior prom.

The staff member smiled briefly at them, asked after their evening, and got a cough from Sam and a careful answer from Jack before he got out at the ground floor. Sam reached out and pressed another parking lot button and grinned up at Jack. "My car."

"Your house, too?" That was a bit more forward than Jack had planned to be, but she didn't seem offended.

"You live across town, don't you? Mine's closer." The way she said it curled his toes and he slid a comfortable arm around her waist and let his nose drift into her hair.

He inhaled deeply, causing her to laugh. The perfume scent of earlier was mostly gone, but what was left was pure Sam Carter. Her hand was resting on his thigh, close enough to make things interesting, but not as close as he would have liked.

_Sweet_.

They got as far as her car before he kissed her again.

It was intended to be a 'see you in fifteen minutes' kind of kiss. It ended up being a 'I want to vacuum your tonsils out of your throat' kind of kiss - the type that Jack hadn't seen in...well, possibly longer than some of the kids tonight had been alive.

The thought should have made him feel old. Somehow, it didn't. The fact that he was kissing Sam Carter on the hood of her car probably had something to do with it. This could get addictive: lips and jaw and neck, and the way her pulse jumped when he licked the hollow at the base of her throat...

He wasn't even going to think about the way her hips were subtly shifting against his. There were some things that didn't need encouragement, whether a guy was seventeen or over halfway to seventy - and that was one of them.

When they came up for air, he hoped she thought he looked as adorable as he thought she did - her mouth slightly swollen from the kissing and a high flush tinging her cheeks.

"This was more fun when we were younger," she said, looking over his shoulder.

Astonished and more than a little hurt, Jack stiffened in a not-good way and opened his mouth to make a sharp retort. Then he realised that she was looking over his shoulder for a reason.

The small black hemisphere on the ceiling of the parking lot gleamed at him in all innocence. _Video surveillance._

"Oh, I don't know, Carter," he said, bending down so his lips brushed her ear. "Think we're giving them a good show?"

His breath hissed out of his lungs as she brushed against him. "I don't give public shows," she murmured. "Want to take this somewhere private?"

Jack pulled back before his libido got too much the better of him. "My place?"

She shook her head with a faint grin. "Mine's closer."

Since he lived on the other side of town there wasn't really an argument for that. And if she was willing to move things fast then Jack wasn't going to complain.

"So I'll follow you home, then?"

Her fingers lingered by his jaw. "You can kiss me again," she suggested smiling. "One for the cameras."

As he tailed her back to her place, Jack reflected that there was something to be said about a woman who knew when to be direct.

"You're sure about this?" He murmured in her ear as she fished through her purse for the house keys.

She tilted her head back so his mouth had little choice but to brush against her earlobe. Jack took that for a definite 'yes.'

He nibbled said earlobe as a way of passing time and distracting the hell out of her - as she picked her keys out of the purse.

By the time she got the key in the lock, he'd moved on to the nape of her neck and the delicately sensitive spot where her neck joined her shoulder. Judging by the slightly laboured edge to her breathing and the way she swayed towards him, it was having exactly the effect he'd hoped for.

The smooth curve of her butt pressing back against his groin had an even more dramatic effect. Fire slid softly through his body, and Jack slid his mouth up her throat and covered her lips with his own. They spent a few minutes quite enjoyably engaged out on the porch.

_Very_ enjoyably engaged.

At some point, Sam turned around so they weren't in a clinch that looked something like a moebius strip, so Jack was more than a little surprised when the door opened behind her.

The porch light coming on was a very different matter.

"Sam, I haven't grounded you in over fifteen years, but I'm willing to make an exception if you keep this up." The voice was male, slightly grumpy, and wry.

_Shit._

Jack felt her freeze under his mouth, and her lips moved in a silent curse before she turned to face her father. "Uh, hey, Dad."

Her greeting to her dad was a quick kiss on the cheek before she looked back at Jack with a look that clearly said, 'This was not in the plan!'

"So," Mr. Carter said, dark eyes resting thoughtfully on Jack. "Am I throwing him back or do you plan to keep him?"

"If I want him thrown back, I'm more than capable of doing it myself, Dad!"

The older man held up his hands. "Just checking."

Well, at least the guy had a sense of humour. It was better than some situations Jack could name. He scrubbed a hand through his hair and hoped he didn't look too sheepish. "Uh, hey. You must be Sam's dad. Jack O'Neill. You can call me Jack."

An equally large, calloused hand took his hand. "Jacob Carter. You can call me General." The dark eyes twinkled, although there was an undertone to the words that Jack mistrusted. And he'd forgotten that Sam's dad was a USAF General. In fact, she had a brother in the military, too: Colonel Mark Carter or something like that.

There was probably a subconscious reason he'd forgotten that bit of information.

A moment of uncomfortable silence followed as the two men measured each other up. Then Sam turned to her dad with an accusatory glare. "You said you wouldn't be back for another week."

"Actually, I said that things _might_ be tied up for another week. They sorted out a lot earlier than expected, so I came to see my Sammie." Jacob leaned his shoulder against the door, effectively blocking the way into the house. Jack had a feeling that the older man would stand there all night if he considered it necessary.

"Your 'Sammie' would be more pleased if her dad would get out of the front door and let us in."

The General's eyes went up at the 'us' and the dark gaze became a little more piercing as it rested on Jack. "Night out on the town?"

Jack fought the instinct to flinch under that gaze. And the instinct to suggest that he go home and see Sam on Monday. He held his ground though. If he had to deal with Jacob Carter to get to his daughter, well, Jack wasn't seventeen anymore. "Senior prom, actually."

"Really?" Jacob eyed Jack a little longer - long enough for Jack to feel decidedly uncomfortable. Then he moved out of the entranceway, although not without the comment, "Well, this brings back memories."

Sam rolled her eyes and reached for Jack's hand to lead him in. "Don't even begin, Dad. Don't even begin."

Jack followed her, very aware of her dad's sharp brown eyes watching him, but also very pleased by Sam's immediate defence of him. And the fact that she wasn't going to give this up just because of a little curve ball.

Life might have a habit of pitching you curve balls. But every now and then, you scored a home run.

God bless Chloe Felger.

- **fin **-

**FINAL NOTES**: For the inquiring minds who want to know who's teaching what, I present, the Shermer High staff listing! (Incomplete.) Blame should land squarely on Tielan's shoulders. She came up with most of these teachers. I just...added a few more for this story.

Hammond - Principal   
Jack - Vice-Principal and English Lit  
Sam - Physics Daniel - Ancient History   
Teal'c - Gym   
Jonas Quinn - Modern History   
Harry Maybourne - Computer studies  
Jay Felger - Trigonometry  
Dr. Lee - Algebra  
Dan Siler - Shop  
Bert Samuels - Civics/Government  
Vala Mal Doran - (melo)Drama  
Malcolm Barrettt - Civics/Government  
Ishta - Domestic Technology  
Cameron Mitchell - Physics  
Carolyn Lam - Personal Counsellor  
Janet Fraiser - Doc


End file.
